Wo (kana)
 |
| wo | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| |||
| transliteration | (w)o | ||
| hiragana origin | 遠 | ||
| katakana origin | 乎 | ||
| spelling kana | 尾張のヲ (W)owari no "(w)o" | ||
| unicode | U+3092, U+30F2 | ||
| braille |  | ||
| kana gojūon | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Kana modifiers and marks | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Multi-syllabic kana | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
を, in hiragana, or ヲ in katakana, is one of the Japanese kana, each of which represents one mora.
Modern usage
In Japanese, this kana is used almost exclusively for a particle; therefore, the katakana form (ヲ) is fairly uncommon in everyday language — mostly used as a stand-in for its hiragana counterpart in texts that need to be written entirely in katakana.
Despite originally representing [ɰo], the syllable is pronounced [o] by almost all modern speakers. Singers may pronounce it with the [w], as may those attempting to emphasize the syllable for clarity. Apart from some literate speakers who have revived [wo] as a spelling pronunciation, though, the onglide is extinct in the modern spoken language.
In Romaji, the kana is transliterated variably as ⟨o⟩ or ⟨wo⟩, with the former being faithful to standard pronunciation, but the latter avoiding confusion with お and オ. Katakana ヲ can sometimes be combined with a dakuten, ヺ, to represent a /vo/ sound in foreign words; however, most IMEs lack a convenient way to do this. The combination ヴォ is used far more frequently to represent the /vo/ sound.
A "wo" sound is usually represented in katakana as ウォ instead. For example, ウォークマン (Wōkuman, "Walkman") and ウォッカ (Wokka, "Vodka")
| Form | Rōmaji | Hiragana | Katakana |
|---|---|---|---|
| Normal w- (わ行 wa-gyō) |
Wo | を | ヲ |
Hiragana を is still used in several Okinawan orthographies for the syllable /o~wo/; in the Ryukyu University system it is /o/, whereas お is /ʔo/. Katakana ヲ is used in Ainu for /wo/.
Stroke order
 |
 |
Other representations
| Preview | を | ヲ | ｦ | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Unicode name | HIRAGANA LETTER WO | KATAKANA LETTER WO | HALFWIDTH KATAKANA LETTER WO | |||
| Encodings | decimal | hex | dec | hex | dec | hex |
| Unicode | 12434 | U+3092 | 12530 | U+30F2 | 65382 | U+FF66 |
| UTF-8 | 227 130 146 | E3 82 92 | 227 131 178 | E3 83 B2 | 239 189 166 | EF BD A6 |
| Numeric character reference | を |
を |
ヲ |
ヲ |
ｦ |
ｦ |
| Shift JIS | 130 240 | 82 F0 | 131 146 | 83 92 | 166 | A6 |
- Braille
| を / ヲ in Japanese Braille | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| を / ヲ wo |
をう / ヲー wō |
ヺ vo |
ヺー vō |
|
 |
 |
|
